Our Inner Life Cycles
By Linda Kaye
Sometime ago, I received a small booklet entitled, "Happy Birthday
Therapy." The friend who sent it thought it might cheer me up "in my
old age", as he laughingly put it. It's a cute book, designed to help
the reader understand about age, growing older, and how to deal with
that.
One of the pages reads: "How old do you feel on the inside? Reflect on
what your answer reveals about you. Celebrate the child within you -
your enthusiasm, passion, hope. Celebrate the adult within you-your
maturity, compassion, wisdom."
Rather profound words, I thought, as I read them. And in reading them
again recently, I wanted to reflect on where I am in my life cycle, and
how these life cycles can affect us as women.
We have only one alternative to aging, and that is death. Obviously,
life therefore is very important to us. The quality of our life is
dependent solely on ourselves - we have total responsibility for what we
do, how we do it and what we feel. I'm not saying that there are not
outside influences to our feelings; rather, that we are responsible for
how we react to those influences.
There are times in our lives when, despite our chronicle age, we feel
very, very old. Our minds, our hearts are old, rather than the body.
We lose sight of the youth that lives within us, we forget that the
child we once were is still in there. Everything we experience,
everything we feel, everything we do remains within the cycle of our
life. We cannot go back and change it. Once a moment is lived, it is
forever imprinted in our life cycle. We might wish it to be different,
it might torment us, but it will never, ever be changed.
I recently reread a favorite book of mine, "A Falling Star," which was
written by a woman living in Africa, and, who, in mid-age, met a younger
man who changed her life. The book talks about their life together, the
love they shared, the enchantment of day-to-day togetherness.
Circumstances allowed them to live differently than you or I, in that
they lived in Africa, and had opportunities and monies you and I don't
have. But the fundamental point of the book is that their love and life
together was one that comes along very rarely. They loved each other
totally, completely, without reservation, accepting each other exactly
as they were. Their life of enchantment continued for nearly two
decades.
Not only does the book put into perspective how outside influences can
so profoundly affect us, it allows us to see that there can be a love
that comes along in life, that so completely fills you that the two
lives are fused together, and there is oneness. These two people
rediscovered the child in each other. They allowed passion and
enthusiasm to encompass their lives, yet allowed maturity, natural
compassion for others and each other, and wisdom, to become the bonds
for that relationship. When the magic ended with the death of the
husband, there was left indomitable love, compassion, dedication to the
other. Somehow, this made the pain of letting go bearable. The
memories of what had been nurtured the healing. I'll be honest in
saying that the story of this couple profoundly altered my life, in that
after reading the book, I chose to seek a relationship and subsequent
marriage, with Vanessa.
So many times, as we age, mentally and emotionally, as well as
physically, we lose sight of this. Society puts us into compact "times
of your life," telling you that simply because you are 45, or 50 or 60,
that you can't do certain things, because it is inappropriate for
someone "your age." Baloney. Age has nothing to do with what you make
of your life. Age should have nothing to do with decisions. What your
heart tells you is right is what should guide you.
There are so many parts to each of us. To hide those parts, squirrel
them away simply because chronological age dictates you are to do so is
to lose the essence of your personhood. As women, we need to appreciate
each facet of our womanhood, from birth to death. So much happens in
between. To put it away, to not experience every moment is a dreadful
loss. Life is not an enchanted and magical dimension. Rather, it is a
myriad of magic and reality, and to avoid it simply because it hurts or
is unpleasant or because someone else tells you it should be avoided, is
to deny everything you were created to be.
Our lives are filled with dreams - and to stop dreaming is to allow
outside influences to overcome your personhood. "If your life dream has
been fulfilled, you may feel that something is still missing. Recast
your dream so that it fits who you are now. Embrace your transformed
dream." (Happy Birthday Therapy) Dreams are simply hopes, emotions you
want to share, possibilities. To stop dreaming gives you nothing to look
forward to, and far too much opportunity to dwell on old dreams that
never came true. Far better to understand that some things are
impossible, but others aren't. Far better to try to make your dreams
come true, even if they aren't in the original context. It is okay to
transform them, change them, modify them, improve them. And it is a
joyful moment when one comes true. If it doesn't, then it was good to
dream it. However, life goes on, and there can be more dreams. To go
backward is to deny yourself - to allow yourself to die emotionally, to
age inside yourself.
All of this is not a question of yourself involved in a gender
relationship. Rather, it is a question of whether or not you are
willing to allow yourself, as a person and as a woman, to be. It is a
question of whether or not you are willing to go past existence, to
purposely seek your own happiness, to accept and put away your past
defeats or lost dreams. It is a question of whether or not you will be
"old" inside, no matter what the outside may seem. There is no reason
that you cannot be as youthful in your mind and heart at your point of
death as you were at your point of birth. You alone are responsible for
what happens in between - no one
else - just you.
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